Nemanja Nikolic takes MLS scoring lead in Fire win

After a bit of a slow start in his first couple matches, Nemanja Nikolic is suddenly one of the hottest strikers in Major League Soccer.

Nikolic scored twice to help the Chicago Fire to a comfortable 3-0 win against the floundering Colorado Rapids on Wednesday at Toyota Park.

Nikolic reached double figure goals in 11 matches. He became the fastest Fire player to 10 goals, taking a record from 2013 MLS MVP Mike Magee. When asked if he was surprised by his own early success, Nikolic bluntly said no.

“I think that the most important thing is the team plays really good," Nikolic said. "I don’t do anything special. I think my teammates make a fantastic job for me. I am all the time in the right place and also like today I don’t have a really difficult job to finish the action. Thanks to my teammates I adapt really good and fast."

With that goal, Nikolic took sole possession of the league lead in goals. He moved past Houston’s Erick Torres, who also had eight entering the night and did not score in the Dynamo’s 2-0 loss at Philadelphia on Wednesday.

"I don’t think about this," Nikolic said of leading the league in goals. "The season is so long so we have a lot of games more. Of course every striker wants to score every game and to be top scorer in the end of the season, but I think it’s too early to speak about this."

The Fire (5-3-3, 18 points) dominated the first half with the wind at their backs on a windy night in Bridgeview. Colorado (2-7-1, 7 points) was in a shell most of the half, hoping to weather the storm before having the wind with them in the second half.

Things did not get better after halftime for the Rapids, which have the lowest point total in the league.

The Fire added a second goal with David Accam finishing off a sequence of quick passes involving Matt Polster, making his first start of the season at right back. Polster initially set up Michael de Leeuw, who appeared to have a shot at an open goal but couldn't reach it. Accam was there to finish it.

Nikolic’s second goal came in the 74th minute with de Leeuw doing the heavy lifting on the play. He flicked the ball around a defender to get free on the right wing and played a perfectly angled ball at the back post where a sliding Nikolic scored.

"My game and my style, I need the players behind me to give me really good balls," Nikolic said. "Like today, Brandon gave me a fantastic ball for the first goal, Michael gave me for the second."

Coach Veljko Paunovic said they knew what they were getting when they signed Nikolic this offseason. Nikolic led the Hungarian League in goals each of his last two seasons there before leading the Polish Ekstraklasa in goals his first season with Legia Warsaw.

“I think he has that natural hunger for scoring goals," Paunovic said. "In his career he has scored so many goals so right now we have him in his prime. That’s important for us. Strikers they live for streaks like this, scoring goals, scoring goals, scoring goals and sometimes when they don’t score goals obviously they are nervous. We know that, we have to manage with that and we always support our guys.”

Nikolic's presence has also opened things up for players like Accam, who has five goals and four assists this season.

“He’s a great finisher and he’s got really good movement," Accam said of Nikolic. "Every time I get the ball I try to look at him and see where he is because I know if I get the ball to him he’s going to score. Also when he moves, he takes away defenders for me."

The Fire, which played in front of an announced crowd of 11,244 after selling out Saturday’s win against Seattle, play again in three days at D.C. United.